Choices
by HeartRose
Summary: When Rhett Butler and Scarlett O'Hara Hamilton left Atlanta Rhett made a choice on the road to Rough and Ready. What if he made a different one?
1. Chapter 1

Rhett Butler sat still as stone in the wagon seat, watching the last of the Confederate troops march out of Atlanta and felt for the first time since the war begun, a tingle of shame. He knew it was foolish after all, he was one man. But watching the older soldiers pull the boy from the muck where he fell his sense of shame only grew.

Scarlett's thin fingers dug harder into his arm and he started suddenly, laying the branch into the nag's back as the last of the ragtag troops disappeared into the burning light.

"Hurry, Rhett, please." She pleaded with him, green eyes wild with barely controlled panic. He checked his urge to join them, those brave fools, and Rhett wondered which mattered more to him. An eleventh hour joining of the Cause or the brave child at his side. He felt a chasm open inside himself. If he made the wrong choice he could lose self and love in one strike.

He drove them on, ignoring the sounds of fright from the darkie and the child. From Melanie he heard nothing. Rhett hoped she simply fainted instead of died. Suddenly the fires were behind them and the way ahead loomed before them black as tar. Rhett stopped the wagon, letting the lathered horse catch his breath. He turned, staring back at the way they'd came before vaulting down from the wagon.

"Scarlett, come down here."

She jumped down with his help and he pulled them a little away from the wagon.

"This is not going to be easy. Maybe we can get past Rough and Ready all right. General Steve Lee was there during this afternoon covering the retreat. Maybe the Yankees aren't there yet. Maybe we can get through there, if Steve Lee's men don't pick up the horse."

"I don't care, Rhett! I will get home and damn any Yankee that tries to stop me."

Rhett smiled, his teeth white in the blackness. Yes, this path before him now might bear fruit. He turned his back on the burning city and lifted Scarlett back into the wagon.

"Well then, Mrs. Hamilton, shall we?"

And together they drove south, towards home. Towards Tara.


	2. Chapter 2

Home, home I'm going home. The word sang in Scarlett's mind and allowed her to keep her head in several close calls along the road to Tara. At the moment they were hiding under a bridge in the pouring rains while men marched above them. If they lost the horse...Scarlett refused to think of it. They would make it home and she would place her head in her mother's lap and this war would fall away and everything would be all right again. She stared out in the rain at Rhett, holding the horse steady, and felt a fluttering in her stomach. On the road when he stopped Scarlett had resisted the urge to grab the whip and drive the horse herself so badly did she wish to be home.

The nag was on his last legs when they crossed by Twelve Oaks. Melanie's cries at seeing the grand old plantation burned to the ground were echoed by Scarlett. They had left the slave quarters but the house and stables had not been spared. The grand staircase where she had flirted with her beaus was all that remained. A sudden sound startled her and Rhett drew his gun, hammer cocked and ready to fire. It was no soldier, just a cow that was desperately in need of milking. Scarlett breathed out, a nervous giggle threatening to turn into full blown laughter but she checked herself remembering that there could be Yankees here still.

"Prissy, tie up that cow. We don't know what we will find at home."

Rhett looked around, remembering the first and only time he had visited Twelve Oaks. That afternoon he had tried to warn them and no one would listen. Now almost all the men at the barbeque were dead and buried in unmarked graves throughout the north. Except him. Rhett shook his head and turned back to the wagon. Prissy had the cow tied up and Scarlett was impatiently waiting for him to remount.

'Hurry, Rhett, we'll be home before sun-up. I'll get to see Mother and once we're home everything will be all right."

If Rhett had the strength he would have told her that it was more likely Tara had been burned down and her family relocated further south. But the only thing keeping her going was the thought of home and despite his liking on pushing her he would not take away her hope for her mother and her home.

The moon was setting by the time they made it up the lane towards Tara. Scarlett looked ready to run up the drive, her whole body tense to spring. Little Wade whimpered in the back of the wagon , loud enough to cover Melanie's moans and weak cries. Rhett wondered idly what Scarlett would do if she died. He wanted to crush her thin body to his, kiss her until she was breathless and begging for more. If Melanie died and Ashley came home...well, he'd killed before. Scarlett belonged to him, even if she didn't realize it yet.

Scarlett jumped from the wagon as the nag fell in the harness in front of an impossibly still standing house. She rushed to the front door as it fell open at her approach and her Pa stepped out to look at her.

"Pa, it's me, your Katie Scarlett. I've come home."

Gerald didn't seem to hear her, he looked off into the night his eyes wild and unfocused. Scarlett felt fear creep up her throat. Why didn't he notice her?

"Pa?"

Finally Gerald turned his face towards her his eyes struggling to focus on her face.

"Katie Scarlett? You're home?"

Scarlett hugged him close whispering over and over in his ear I'm home, I'm home. Rhett helped Prissy and Wade out of the wagon while Pork and Dilcey came out of the house exclaiming over Scarlett. He handed Melanie's baby to Prissy with instructions not to drop him and picked Miss Melanie up to carry her inside. He nodded his head at Pork and Gerald, heading towards the parlor when Gerald's words reached his ears just before Scarlett's screams.

"You're mother is dead."


	3. Chapter 3

Scarlett took her father off to the study where her mother so often worked, still lightly scented with lemon verbena. Pork followed with a gourd of whiskey. Rhett didn't attempt to interrupt, instead he settled Miss Melly into bed and went to find Wade. The little boy had been so brave and Rhett intended to tell him. It took nothing to make children love him so he saw no point in not showing Wade affection. He found the boy camped in Scarlett's room hiding beneath her bed. The child shivered with fear but after some coaxing from Rhett left his dusty hiding place. Rhett carried him downstairs and sat him down on his knee in the parlor.

"Are you all right, little one?" He asked, for once sincere. Wade nodded his head, big tears still rolling down his cheeks. Rhett felt for his handkerchief and wiped the boy's face and motioned for him to blow his nose.

"There, that's much better, don't you think? Since your mother is talking with your grandfather how would you like Uncle Rhett to tell you a story?"

Wade relaxed onto Rhett's lap, a large yawn stretching his mouth wide. Sleepily he laid his head on Rhett's chest and nodded, brown eyes wide.

"Once upon a time..."

Mammy watched the pair sitting in Miz Ellen's parlor, her large face filled with grief for losing her child and happiness at having Miz Scarlett home. This man in the parlor worried her, she hadn't been in Atlanta with Miz Scarlett, she didn't know who he was or what he wanted. And it wasn't fitting for him to be staying here. She wouldn't discuss this with Miz Scarlett soon. It ain't fitting, it just ain't fitting. But when Scarlett emerged from the study with her father Mammy could clearly see Scarlett wouldn't be having any more conversations tonight.

"Mammy, take me to the girls. I want to see them. I want to know what happened."

Tempted to argue with her Mammy checked herself seeing that Scarlett wouldn't listen to anything that didn't concern what she'd asked. So together they went upstairs to look on the sleepy faces of Carreen and Suellen and here Mammy told Scarlett of how typhoid had come to Tara.

"The typhoid hit the Slatterys first and Miz Ellen went to nurse them. After that the girls came down, your momma and I nursed them alone. I's safe since I had it when I's small but your Momma, she didn't have the strength to fight it off. She was so tired, my poor chile."

Dilcey spoke up from the corner where she was feeding Melanie's baby.

"She called out a name befor she die. Feepeep. She called for him twice then die."

Mammy glared daggers at Dilcey but said nothing. Scarlett wondered for a moment at the name but the thought was swept away on a whiskey tide. She put her hand in Mammy's and let her lead the way to bed.

The large house fell quiet, quieter then Scarlett had ever known it to be and she dreamed of the O'Haras who had come before and through the night they gave her the strength for what needed done.

Rhett slept downstairs on the velvet rug, his own dreams filled with the starving faces of Confederate soldiers as they marched out to certain death under a doomed flag. Rhett tossed in his sleep, seeking escape from a guilt that to his logical, waking mind would be senseless. He was a Southerner and at the last desperate hour he abandoned the South in such a way that he could never take back. This would be his cross, the Old Guard of the South would never forgive him, there would be no change in their behavior towards him. Now and forever Rhett Butler would be outcast. Should he marry and have children they would be outcast in this society.

And then the dream changed. Where before Rhett avoided the eyes that reproached him now he stared straight at them, his back straight, his head unbowed. They made their choice to fight and die, to leave women and children behind but Rhett was not like them, could never be like them. They would call him a rebel, a scallywag, a turncoat. In reality Rhett Butler was none of these things. He was an intelligent man who would not fight for a losing cause that he did not believe in, he would not die for speech-makers who spoke of states' rights. He would live and he would flourish. As the dream ended he opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling above him in darkness.

"I will not apologize for surviving, not to any of them. They lost rights to my life and conduct when Charleston threw me out. I am my own man. Any cause I fight for will be one I pick for myself."

His eyes slid closed and he slept dreamless the rest of the night.

Rhett woke to the sound of bustle in the kitchen. Bleary eyed he made his way there, his back cracking from his night on the floor. He could hear Mammy and Pork giving Scarlett a rundown of what they had and an even longer list of what they had lost. Scarlett looked up when Rhett entered the kitchen and gave him a small nod. He lounged in the doorway watching her order the two around with all the command of an army general. When Scarlett finished assigning tasks to the two she turned her eyes to Rhett.

"We have no horses and Atlanta burned. There's more then enough work here for everyone and I can use every pair of hands we have. I would like if you stayed, Rhett. The girls will be useless for a few weeks yet while they recover and Melly...well, Melly may still die. But I will not lose Tara, not while I live."

Rhett looked at the green-eyed girl, her Southern Belle simpers and airs cast aside and he knew he had never loved her more. He shrugged off his coat and laid it across the chair in front of him.

"I'm yours to command, Mrs. Hamilton. Where shall I begin?"

Scarlett rubbed her neck, turning to look out the window.

"We need the sow and her shoats from the swamp. I need a pen built to keep them contained."

Rhett interrupted, "Keeping them penned in the swamp will keep them safe should the Yankees come through again. I can build something for the cow there too."

Scarlett nodded, trusting him to take care of that for her. She meanwhile would take a basket to Twelve Oaks and find food for the family. This war had to end soon. Once the war ended they would be safe again. As Scarlett left the kitchen Mammy followed her into the hall.

"Chile, I cannot stand by and let this man stay at Tara. He's your beau and it's just not fitting."

Ignoring her words Scarlett pulled on her sunbonnet and tucked the large basket higher on her arm.

"He stays, Mammy. We need him."

And with that she walked out the door.

Rhett headed down to the swamp with Pork who looked ready to complain about his treatment since he was a house worker, not a field hand. But Captain Butler was not family so he held his tongue. Rhett planned on building the pens first down deep in the swamp so no enterprising Yankee or even their own soldiers could find the livestock. Finding a good spot to build the pens Rhett set to work gathering what wood he could before he resorted to chopping down one of the trees. He sent Pork after the pigs and began his work.


	4. Chapter 4

Ashley Wilkes was dead. They received word at Christmas when Frank Kennedy and the rest of the commissary department joined them for a week. Blood pounded in her ears and her body longed to fade into blackness but no, she would not shame herself in front of them all. He was not her husband. He would never be her husband. He would never be hers. The tears burned in her throat and she could not speak when Melly threw herself at Scarlett, clinging to her. Scarlett stood like a tree, dead at the core but still upright. Rhett stood back from the family, his eyes never leaving Scarlett's face. He ignored the dirty looks he received from the soldiers his body tense to grab Scarlett should her strength fail her. Only after she left the room will Melanie did his eyes leave hers. Rhett's eyes caught Frank's and the latter glared at him respect for the O'haras all that held his tongue. He held Rhett's glaze a moment longer before going to comfort Suellen. Rhett felt out of place and out of sorts. He slipped out of the room and headed upstairs to where Scarlett and Melanie grieved.

Melanie dabbed tears away from her eyes and drew in a shaky breath. She watched Scarlett resisting the urge to cry before taking pity on the broken woman. None of us can help who we love, she thought, my husband was a lucky man to be loved by two wonderful women. She pulled Scarlett down beside her and tenderly held the broken woman.

"It's alright, Scarlett, I know how much you loved him. It's alright to cry."

And Scarlett cried.

The months faded into one another as the war drew to a predictable close. The North pushed the South back time and again until at last Lee surrendered. The news reached Tara in the early spring and Scarlett felt peace for the first time since Christmas. It was over. No more would she fear the Yankees burning what little cotton she and her family could pick. Now at last they could begin to rebuild. And Rhett...here her thoughts turned dark. He would leave now that the war had ended. Leave her. But why should she care, she didn't love the man. But even had she had the thought she realized it was no longer quite true. When had her feelings change from friendship into love? His hands were as calloused as hers and many a nights they had stayed up long after the house slept and spoke of their hopes for after the war. Both had mellowed and while not gentle with one another were at least respectful. Many a time he held her as she cried out her fears of still losing Tara to a rogue solider or a Union troop with an urge to fire a plantation house. She considered this for a moment, feeling at her loss of Ashley and finding the pain to be that of missing a friend and not a love. She felt dizzy, her whole existence in question. Normally Scarlett would push this thinking aside to be reviewed in a far-flung tomorrow. But it refused to leave her head. She never truly loved Ashley. Rather instead she loved an idea of what he was, her shining knight of silver. What a disservice she did to him! And to Rhett who she realized with a shock must love her. Why else would he have stayed on at Tara so long as he had?

Rhett watched Scarlett as he had been since word of his plan's completion reached him. How was Ashley Wilkes to know his second in command knew Rhett Butler. Rhett Butler, who had so generously agreed to pay this second's exorbitant fee required to leave the army, if the second could do him one favor first. Rhett saw Scarlett turn towards him, rapture in her eyes. It did not matter how Ashley Wilkes died so long as he died. Death suited the proud man and the world after the war would have no place for his ilk. Scarlett was in his arms confessing her love and he held her close, at last she would be his and his alone. He made his choice long before the road to Tara. He made his choice the night he danced with her at the bazaar. No matter the cost Scarlett O'Hara would be his. And now he allowed a smile and kissed her with all his might.

This was one choice he wouldn't regret.

The End


End file.
